The Economy: President Obama took office promising a new era of responsibility and accountability in Washington. But has there been any president in modern times who passes the buck more often?

It's getting tiresome, and it happened again last week during a speech in Minnesota, when President Obama blamed Republicans for the dreadful first-quarter GDP numbers showing the economy shrinking by 2.9%.

"So far this year," Obama said, in waving off the winter swoon, "Republicans in Congress have blocked or voted down every single serious idea to strengthen the middle class. They've said no to raising the minimum wage. They've said no to fair pay.

"Some of them have denied that there's even a problem, despite the fact that women are getting paid 77 cents for every dollar a man is getting paid."

Those big bad Republicans, who control one-half of one of three branches of government, "don't do anything except block me and call me names," he whined.

Since only 5% of American workers earn the minimum wage, does anyone believe this is the magic bullet to solve our slow-growth rut?

The problem with declining wages the past decade, as we have explained on these pages, is a problem for both genders, not just women.

And speaking of not bringing issues to a vote, how about Harry Reid in the Senate blocking the Keystone XL Pipeline, medical device tax repeal and a change in the 30-hour-a-week rule under ObamaCare, to name a few job bills the upper house has buried?

This is becoming a predictable pattern of economic excuse-making every time we get rocked by bad news.

At first, the White House blamed the underperforming economy on the Polar Vortex, the severe cold weather in the East and Midwest in January and February. Then, when the gross national product numbers were revised downward, no one believed a cold winter could cause a 3% economic contraction. A survey of other really cold winters in the past reveals the economy still managed to grow.

Last year, Obama suggested the economy was weak because of budget cuts forced on him by House Speaker John Boehner and the Republicans. White House economists likened fiscal "austerity" to the medieval practice of "bleeding the patient" to cure him.

Never mind that the deficit that year was still well over $500 billion — hardly austerity.

When the economy got tripped up in 2012, the president blamed the disappointment on "economic headwinds." He actually used that phrase more than a dozen times.

See Also

Politics: The White House has denounced an anti-abortion group's videos of Planned Parenthood's activities as "fraudulent" and circled its wagons to defend the indefensible. What kind of White House is this?For an institution that might argue that it doesn't have a dog in this fight, the White ...

Iran Deal: After initially refusing, the United Nations' International Atomic Energy Agency will brief senators Wednesday. Are its nuclear monitoring practices kept secret because they're inadequate?Yukiya Amano, the director general of the IAEA, until Friday was refusing to brief senators on ...

Corruption: The third installment of released emails fell hard Friday on the Hillary Clinton campaign. If her candidacy lasts until the end of the summer, there's much more wrong with this country than we thought.Friday had to be an extraordinarily trying day for the Democratic front-runner. On the ...

Regulation: As businesses struggle to stay open and lay off workers, the Environmental Protection Agency is preparing one of the biggest hiring binges in America outside of Google. Good news? Hardly.Barack Obama's EPA has announced it will try to hire 800 new regulators over the next several ...

Taxes Vs. Prosperity: The Real Wedge Issue Ronald Reagan died 11 years ago, and his presidency ended a quarter century ago. But my, how his tax-cutting ideas live on. The living legacy of Reaganomics, or supply-side economics, is that tax rates keep falling all over the world. Imitation really is ...

About Investor's Business Daily

Investor’s Business Daily provides exclusive stock lists, investing data, stock market research, education and the latest financial and business news to help investors make more money in the stock market. All of IBD’s products and features are based on the CAN SLIM® Investing System developed by IBD’s Founder William J. O’Neil, who identified the seven common characteristics that winning stocks display before making huge price gains. Each letter of CAN SLIM represents one of those traits.

Select market data is provided by Interactive Data Corp. Real Time Services. Price and Volume data is delayed 20 minutes unless otherwise noted, is believed accurate but is not warranted or guaranteed by Interactive Data Corp. Real Time Services and is subject to Interactive Data Corp. Real Time Services terms. All times are Eastern United States. *Reflects real-time index prices.